Paying for one's waste has brought home to each
of us a growing awareness of the full lifecycle
costs of "throwing it out."

Getting Started: Why
Pay-As-You-Throw?

Mount Vernon is a small, attractive college community
in eastern Iowa, home to professional commuters as
well as college staff. The city's income level ranks
above average for the state. In July 1991, the city
began to charge directly for the collection of residential
trash, bulky items, grass clippings, and garden waste.
At the same time, bins were distributed to begin curbside
collection of materials for recycling. We expected
these two steps to work together. Charging for each
container of trash provided the financial incentive
to move material from trash containers into recycling
bins-the city would then contract to collect this
recycling material free of direct charge.

How Does It Work?

Mount Vernon, IA

Population: 3,700

Type of Community: Suburban

Type of Program: Tags

Program Start Date: July 1991

The city's pay-as-you-throw system works quite
simply. Households purchase $1.75 tags at city hall
or one of several stores. As a public service, stores
sell the tags with no markup. The price for collection
is one tag for each container, which must be no
more than 30 gallons or 40 pounds, and multiple
tags for bulky items. Homeowners also receive a
$7 solid waste bill monthly. The city discounts
the monthly fee for households defined as low income
under the school lunch program.

While the revenue from tag sales roughly covers
the cost of trash collection and landfill fees,
the monthly billing finances the "free of charge"
collection of recycling material, leaves, and brush.
Residents say tags are a fair way to pay for trash
disposal, and the combination of tags and monthly
fees provides a steady revenue to the city.

Why Tags?

"We
have not only reduced the amount of trash sent to
the landfill, but also generated an enormous amount
of civic pride in our efforts to do something positive
for our community environment"- Don Cell,
Chair of the Reduction and Recycling Committee

The city council appointed the Reduction and Recycling
Committee to develop a solid waste program. We spent
over a year researching the experiences of other
communities and consulting experts, and eventually
recommended tags for waste collection to accompany
curbside recycling. Tags cost little to print, permit
residences to continue using their containers within
the volume and weight limits, adhere securely at
all temperatures, are convenient for participating
merchants to handle, and can easily be removed when
the trash is collected. Stealing of tags has not
been a problem in this residential community.

Success: Increased
Waste Reduction and Recycling

Pay-as-you-throw played a major role in motivating
waste reduction and nearly doubling recycling. The
city estimates that the trash the typical resident
sent to the landfill decreased by nearly 40 percent,
from 45 pounds per week in 1990 to 27 pounds in
1995. In addition, requiring a tag for each container
of grass clippings and garden waste has nearly eliminated
the collection of these materials. The total reduction
of residential trash and all yard waste per household
exceeds the goal of 50 percent waste reduction the
state legislature has established for the year 2000.
Dumping, subject to a $1000 fine in Mount Vernon,
has not been a problem.

Altogether, by recycling and reducing trash, and
by leaving grass cuttings on the lawn or composting
it, the average household saved $47 last year in
fewer tags purchased, a total saving of some $46,000
for our 980 households. At 9 pounds per household
per week, Mount Vernon leads all 17 cities in Linn
County in recycling.

In addition to putting more into recycling bins,
residents of Mount Vernon have reduced waste in
various ways: 1) recycling appliances; 2) recycling
materials the city does not accept at drop-off facilities
in Cedar Rapids and places of employment that recycle
these items; 3) backyard composting of organic wastes;
4) purchase of reuseable rather than disposable
materials; and 5) more yard sales. Much of this
additional recycling and reduction is doubtless
motivated by the tags that residents must purchase
to send trash to the landfill. We believe that such
incentives would also work with less expensive drop-off
recycling programs in other cities.

As Mount Vernon's mayor, Rick Elliot, says: "Our
program has been very successful due to the initial
involvement of a large number of citizens, continued
expansion of recycling opportunities, community
education and ownership of the program, and a very
civic-minded, cooperative recycling and refuse vendor.
This program works and it works well."

How Mount Vernon's
Program Could Be Even Better

The major challenge inherent in any reduction and
recycling program is informing the public. The city
needs to do better at keeping households current
on changes in the recycling program. One successful
example is an information packet prepared by the
Recycling and Reduction Committee that explained
to households how, with reasonably frequent mowing,
grass cuttings left to decompose produce a healthier
lawn. Informing households about alternative ways
to deal with wastes goes hand in hand with pay-as-you-throw
to maximize the effectiveness of the financial and
environmental incentives.